Hope Long Gone
by ditzydizzydessy101
Summary: George's thoughts on the day he killed Lennie. Thought that Steinbeck's characters needed more development? His scenes more life? His plot less predictability? Here's an ending that you never saw coming. And yet...it works. More than you could imagine.


**Just an essay for lit class that I thought came out pretty well.**

**Note- this strictly follows canon (except that it uses proper English, because I had to turn it in to a teacher), but develops things that, according to my story, festered during the silences when we don't know what anyone is thinking.**

**Who but Steinbeck himself is to say that George wasn't pining a long-lost love during those hours on end that he played solitare? **

**Disclaimer: definitely, definitely not mine**

Hope Long Gone

Dearest Clara,

This is the last letter I shall ever pen to you, so this is good bye. I will tell you why in just a few moments, but for now I want to cherish your beautiful face as I remember it—shining hair, perfect face, sparkling eyes, and angelic smile. I draw my icon from the many glorious summer days spent before things grew bad—before you pleaded so desperately with me to take Lennie away to preserve his innocence.

How you loved the brute!

You were still cheery that last summer, vivacious and full of life and adventure, before sadness and dread started sapping away your very life.

Your eyes will darken in my direction in only a moment, however, and a scowl will mar your pretty face. That is the image of you, most darling goddess, that will forever etch itself in my mind and haunt my waking dreams, should I deign to think of you.

Lennie, your darling Lennie, whom you loved like your own child, whom I envied for the affection you bestowed upon him in torrents, who was so innocent as to never want any trouble, is dead—murdered by my own vile hand.

Shot.

Obliterated.

Wiped off of the face of the earth.

You needn't look so horrified, my dear Clara, for you knew long ago that his life would end this way. You knew, perhaps, from the very moment you saw him and his beaming, childlike smile, that he would never stand a chance in a world as harsh as this—the odds were stacked impossibly high against him. His very innocence painted a target on him, one that he couldn't outrun or avoid—it always caught up with him in the end, in worse and worse ways, until it demanded his life as payment. Perhaps, if he'd been smart or charming or wealthy, he might have added a few years to his numbered days, but he wasn't, and now he is buried beneath the unforgiving ground.

You are glaring at me with a dazzling fury, Clara dearest, but it won't change anything. I loved him immensely, you know that, but I loved you infinitely more. I did as you begged me to and took him away—from you, and then, later, from life—before he lost his priceless innocence, so rare and beautiful in today's world and so precious to you. He lost his life instead, however, and the blame will forever lie with me instead of you, though it was you who begged me to do it.

This is the first time that I can stare at the moon's luminous glow and not hear your anguish as you cried for Lennie—that night before we fled from you, so many years ago—and not see your pain as you begged me to rescue him before he realized with wrenching, unbearable guilt that he'd stolen the life of a poor child. He had killed a girl, and you were cold enough to hide the truth from him, the terror-stricken family, and the authorities. Then you asked me to take him away—kill him, if I had to—because you had heard from someone far more human than you that death's cool, impersonal embrace was preferable to being perpetually shattered into a million, heart-broken pieces every moment of life.

Perhaps it is, perhaps it isn't—but I won't know for a long time yet, because I am choosing a different path: I will live, Clara, though you did not. I will keep hoping, though you gave up. I will mold for myself, and for those who will teach me how to love once more—Candy and Slim, perhaps, and maybe Crooks, or anyone else for whom I feel affection—a life worth living.

That is more than you ever did, more hope and love than your small, cold heart could bear. And for that reason, Clara darling, I now say good bye.

I realize now that these letters were, in truth, never written to you or for you—even those first ten or so when you were still alive. You were nothing more than the name of a hope long gone that could not yet be forgotten, and I clung to you for that very reason.

You will be forgotten now, though, because despite your beautiful face and love for Lennie, you preferred to die rather than dare to allow yourself to love anyone else.

Yours as of yesterday, but mine alone today,

George Milton

**This was written for Lit class, and I'll say right now that I hated the book. The characters were flat, the plot-although great in principle-lacked proper development, because he manipulated the characters to act according to the plot, rather than the plot to be the natural progression of events... Anyway, I wrote this, and the assignment was to write a diary entry from George's POV to explain his thoughts on the day he killed Lennie.**

**My point with this essay is to prove how little we know Steinbeck's characters--I added a lot more development to a couple, and WHALA! this is what I got. **

**Possible slight OOC, but with how little we know the characters, I don't think I can say... Hope you liked it, though, whether you liked the book or not!**


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